Through It All
by TheLadyHoll
Summary: After her heart was broken there was never anyone strong or willing enough to break through that wall to get to her, rescue her from herself. That is, until Albus came into her life and like the phoenix of his Patronus, brought back to life what she thought died long ago. Rekindling the fire in her heart. Not to mention the new life stirring inside her that put them all in danger.
1. Prologue

**Hello once again dear readers, likely some new & likely some old. (Don't worry, my other fics have not been abandoned, merely paused momentarily!)**

**Welcome, welcome, welcome! So this would be my very first attempt (not even published attempt but first attempt period) of a Harry Potter FF. There is not likely any trivia or nuances in the books I'm unaware of, and yes, you may take that as a challenge!**

**I really do hope you like this attempt. Some of you, I hope, even if not avid HP fans, will enjoy the story simply for its writing. And for others, there is absolutely mention of all characters' backstory as supplied by J.K. Rowling. Feel free to msg me for further direction/validation of you are wondering where I've gotten my facts from. **

**As always, slight poetic licensing is taken by me but the story and its characters remain COMPLETELY CANON. (Sorry for the yelling, pet peeve of mine is extreme character manipulation). **

**Now that I've rambled on for likely half the promised words in this prologue, I have only this to say: "Nitwit, blubber, odment & tweak!"**

**Enjoy & Review!**

Minerva McGonagall's eyes widened in surprise and she gripped the centuries old oak desk tightly as she felt a breath of warm air on her neck and a pair of large hands slip round her own trim waist; hands that to anyone who was looking in that direction would appear not to exist, invisible.

"Albus," she murmured, barely holding back the breathy moan caught in the back of her throat as her lover's nimble fingers teased the undersides of her breasts unbeknownst to the class of fifth years she was currently teaching that period.

Fighting back the plaintive mew in her voice, she cleared her throat and clapped her hands for the class' attention. "I have a meeting with the Headmaster in a quarter of an hour and I would like to at least attempt to sort through some of the drivel that undoubtedly makes up a goodly portion of some of your essays. So that being said, class is dismissed for the day – homework is on the board."

She waved her wand arm elegantly and her neat scrolling script appeared on the chalkboard behind her outlining the assignment for that evening. She managed to keep her composure until the last few dawdling students had filed out before flinging a hand haphazardly at the door to lock it magically and twisting around to entwine herself in the arms of her lover of more than twenty years.

"Albus…you mustn't…Oh Merlin…improper," her weak protests turned into a mere sigh of remonstration that quickly turned to burning desire as Albus Dumbledore's lips overtook hers in a fierce display of possessiveness and arousal.

As Minerva wore down his concentration with her roaming hands and tongue, the invisibility charm he had cast over himself dissipated and wore off as well so that he was once more visible and whole.

"Do you know how extraordinarily irresistible you are when you're at the front of the class, educating the magical masses in that stern and if I may say so, incredibly sexy way you do?"

"Apparently," McGonagall tried to look disapproving but failed miserably as one side of her mouth quirked up in a smile.

"And that bun! Lord, help the man who knows what tumbling lustrous locks are ensnared in such tight and solemn repose." Tenderly, and without using magic, Albus carefully unpinned her hair so that it fell loosely about her shoulders in a glorious, thick riot of dark chestnut waves that reached more than halfway down her back.

Minerva closed her eyes and let her head fall back, groaning lightly with relief now that the pins were no longer pulling her hair tight against her scalp.

"Now my dear, you said something about an appointment with the Headmaster?" Blue eyes twinkled down at her full of mischief and merriment as he held out a gentlemanly hand for her to rise from her seat and she flew into his arms, loving him with uncharacteristic reckless abandon long into the night.

******Shall I continue? **I have another two chapters written after this, and the plot has been completely thought out through to the end. 

**If so, please proceed to cast an 'Incentive Spell' by pressing the Review button, stating clearly the magic words: 'Writeus Moreus' and providing a few words or so and your opinion. Cheers!**


	2. Chapter 1: Hogwarts: A History Vol II

**So one reviewer asked a lot of good questions about the story, the time period, plot etc. They were anonymous however so I'll have to answer this way! Hopefully this chapter will make a few things clearer & hook you to the story!**

The dust of the Second Wizarding War seemed to be settling a year after its occurrence.

The Ministry of Magic was rebuilding itself from all levels, families were returning to their homes after fleeing for fear of their lives. Voldemort's death had scattered the remaining death eaters so far across the globe that there was little fear of a return, though the Auror's Office still kept a watchful eye out for any signs of uprising or new leadership. And Hogwarts had been rebuilt, and with her new post as Headmistress, Minerva swore no evil should pass through it again under her watch.

Best of all, perhaps, was the miracle that had occurred shortly after the final battle at Hogwarts that she still could barely grasp as real. Harry's 'death', and the shift in the spiritual and magical continuum that had occurred with it and Voldemort's demise had sent powerful after-tremors through the magical world, causing extreme feats of magic to be performed wandlessly, sourced from the core of the Earth itself.

The most learned wizards from across the globe had converged recently at a conference in London to try and figure out what had caused the 'involuntary magic' that seemed to have sprung from Nature itself in the following year. Minerva daren't question what had happened too strongly, if she did she feared she would lose him again. To her, perhaps the biggest miracle was that Albus was back, alive and as curiously corporeal as ever.

In the aftermath of battle, she had held herself together until every student was sent home, whether living or in a casket, but after that she had collapsed in the midst of the rubble of what had been her and Albus' beloved home and school.

The school had been her life, Albus had been her life, and they were both gone – and with their passing, she too felt as though her soul had died and her body cruelly refused to follow. It had been hard enough to go on after Albus' death, indeed she had stayed in her room for a week, not eating, barely breathing except for the sobs which wracked her chest.

The only thing that had kept her going was the knowledge that the time for battle was near, and it was that duty that brought her back to her feet again. Duty to the school she and Albus had loved so strongly, duty to the students she had sworn to protect, duty to the Order and to Harry, and duty to Albus' memory.

All her life, Minerva McGonagall had been brought up to understand that it was duty above all that was important, and that without following that duty, there was no courage and no honour. But it had been unbearable to watch as Death Eaters came into her school as acting faculty, and she felt as though the duty she had followed all her life had failed her, and her it.

But almost a year and a half after his death, he had returned.

_The school was empty, the staff who had returned to help rebuild the school were living in Hogsmeade during the restoration, all except Minerva. She hadn't left the school since the final battle, and no one could pull her away from it. Her friends had tried; Poppy Pomfrey, Pomona Sprout and Rolanda Hooch had begged her to come live with any one of them. It wasn't healthy, they told her, to live like this. _

_But still caught in the throes of her grief, she had responded coldly and woodenly that remaining at Hogwarts was the only way she could live at all. And the wounded, almost dead expression in her eyes as she spoke convinced her friends of that fact, and they hadn't tried again. Instead they had stayed, along with most of the original Hogwarts staff, to help her rebuild the school once more. One night, as she had wandered the halls of the castle as the only living thing in its walls, she had heard a faint rustling which she simply attributed to the wind sweeping through an unfilled crack or crevice in the stone. But as she continued to walk through the empty corridor, a shadow moved at the end of it. _

_One tear slipped down her cheek, and her hand clutched at the robes at her chest as if her heart were breaking and she were trying to hold it together. "No…You're not real," she had whispered brokenly, as if it destroyed her to speak the words. "It's my mind, God, get a hold of yourself Minerva, Albus is dead. He's dead!" Her voice had risen to a yell as she tried to convince herself that was she was seeing was only her imagination, a cruel trick of the mind. _

_But then the spectre had spoken her name, softly and with such achingly familiar tenderness that it weakened her knees and she had fallen, sobbing as she screamed out spells to make the vision go away. _

_However, the 'vision' merely swept the oncoming spells away with a flick of his wand before disarming her with a softly murmured 'Expelliarmus' as he came closer. _

"_Minerva," the spectre of her dead love spoke again and she screamed with grief. Albus himself was crying now as well as he saw the broken, sobbing witch at his feet, knowing he was the cause of this pain. _

"_I'm alive, Tabby. This isn't a dream, I swear to you." Minerva started visibly at the use of her pet name that only Albus Dumbledore had called her when they were alone together. He took her gently by the hands and helped her to her feet as he watched a hundred different emotions flit across her face as she took in the impossible scene before her. _

_The warm flesh touched her, lifted her to her feet and she forced herself to look into the figure's eyes, thinking that that would shatter the illusion – there were no other eyes that could ever compare to those of her love's. _

_But the gently crinkled orbs were as brilliantly blue as ever, and held the same love, and knowledge they always had, but now were filled with a fiercer fire and regret than she had ever seen. _

'_A-Albus, it isn't really you, is it? It, it c-can't b-be you," she whispered hoarsely. _

_In answer, the man in front of her turned slightly, drawing out his wand once more before looking deeply into her eyes and yelling out 'Expecto Patronum!'_

_Minerva watched in horror, and disbelief and amazement as a ghostly Phoenix erupted from his wand in sparks and shimmers of silver, calling out in a piercing, clear tone, before spreading its wings and fading in the dusky shadows of the exposed sky. _

_Her knees gave out once more and she crumpled. Albus caught her to him as she fell against his chest, sobbing. After several long moments, the tear filled eyes registered a flash of familiar anger and she begain beating at his chest with her fists, seeing that he had taken her wand. _

"_How could you?" She screamed. "I needed you, Hogwarts needed you, Harry needed you? How could you leave us, how could you leave me? I thought you were dead!" Her flailing fists stilled as she buried her face in his warm, breath filled chest and continued to cry helplessly, unable to stop the terrible, animal like keens that erupted from her throat and from deeper in her soul than she ever could have imagined. _

"_Oh Min, Oh Tabby, I never would have left you, never. I was dead, I had died." Still holding her up, he carried most of her weight as he led her to a stone bench on the side of the corridor. _

"_I don't understand it fully myself. The night of the final battle, when Harry and Voldemort were killed, I met Harry in the empty space. A space not of the living or the dead, but a space inside his very conscience; I explained to him then, everything, and despite what I had done though I believed it at the time to be what was right, he forgave me when I never expected him to. And I think that his love, and his sacrifice, being so young and so burdened with adult responsibility, in part rendered some of the intense and ancient magic that has been occurring all over in the time since the battle. At least on my part. I am alive, Minerva. As old as I ever was, but alive, fully and completely, with as many years left as anybody. And I can only hope that there is still some small future for us, even if it is not as much of a future as I would be selfish enough to ask for and want."_

_He rocked Minerva softly as she cried, holding her tightly as she clung to him and sobbed as though her heart was breaking for a second time – although in actuality, the pain she felt was the pain of it healing again, once more becoming whole now that its other half was back from the dead. _

_He went on to explain that several of those who had died had come back, not all, but a select few. Among them were Fred Weasely and Severus Snape. The day after he'd come back, he'd explained, he had gone directly to see the one contact he had left at the ministry that he trusted above all else. There he learned that his was the fourth documented resurrection across the country. _

"_I didn't come to you first, Minerva, because I didn't know if I was staying. I couldn't do this to you knowing that I'd cause you the pain of losing me again. But it's been a week since I've been back, and only now have I returned from trying to get the full story on what magic happened after the battle. And perhaps we'll never truly know, I myself do not deign to believe that I know all there is to this, or any magic. It is, as I've always believed, a leap of faith. But oh, the rewards that are reaped from that risk…" _

_She had quieted now, and simply lay in his arms, her head against his chest – the tears falling softly from her eyes as she held him as closely as she could. _

"_I know better than to ask this of you, Minerva. But the folly of an old man was not erased by death. Could you ever find it in yourself to forgive me? My own mind's absolution may never come, but I shouldn't like to live in the shadow of your disdain either."_

_Minerva lifted her head shakily, saying nothing, but pressing her lips to his as her tears wet his face and beard. "Yes," she breathed. "Yes Albus, I'll forgive you if you forgive me for the mess I made of the school and what it stands for. I tried, and I failed. I was no you."_

"_No darling, in almost all ways, you are better. I've come back, knowing I've been dead, but with no real memory of where I was while I was dead. It's simply a kind of glow that comes with the memory, much like the strongest Patronus possible to make. But I saw everything that happened down here while I was gone. I have never been so proud of you Minerva. Never had I guessed you to possess such unerring skill and bravery and heart. I knew you contained all of those qualities, but not in the amount you showed during the final year of the War. I'm so proud of you, Tabby."_

_He pressed his lips to her forehead and she sighed, bringing his face down to meet hers as she kissed him once more. He could see that she was exhausted and shivering, and with every reason to be. So he carried her back to the rooms she was occupying during the reconstruction and conjured a large cup of hot cocoa and a plethora of brightly colored hot water bottles which he wrapped in the blankets he tucked her in as he put her to bed. _

_He could see that she was fighting sleep as her eyelids fluttered closed and she forced them open once more. "Min, Min you've got to get some rest. You're spent, you'll make yourself ill, more so than I suspect you already are." He brushed her hair back from her pale, drawn face, still marked with the damp trails of her tears. _

"_P-please Albus, don't leave," she pleaded quietly, not able to look him in the eyes during this moment of uncharacteristic weakness. "I can't wake up to find you gone, I just can't."_

"_Close your eyes, Tabby. I'm not leaving, not now and not ever. Even when I was dead, I never really left you. Every moment I knew what you were doing and loved you all the more for it. Shhh, darling, rest…I swear to you I'll be here when you wake." He cuddled her closer to his chest, rhythmically stroking her hair and her back; breathing a sigh of relief as her eyes finally closed in slumber. _

For the most part, things had sorted themselves out. The few other families that had gotten loved ones back from the snares of death rejoiced, and those who hadn't eventually picked up the pieces and moved on. It was a year later now and Hogwarts had been almost entirely rebuilt. Dumbledore had once more been reinstated as headmaster, a position Minerva McGonagall was all too happy to remove herself from.

Almost as happy, in fact, as she was to be making the move from her previous chambers to those of Dumbledore's. Hers were kept as they were, of course, for appearances, and a charm had been cast so that with the use of a password, her chambers and Dumbledore's were connected to one another. It would indeed be a relief not to have to sneak around after hours in her Animagus form so that she and Albus could have a few stolen moments, or hours that is, of forbidden pleasures.

Minerva finally drifted to sleep in the arms of her lover, tired and pleasured beyond any further thought after the round(s) of lovemaking that had followed Albus' disruption on her 5th year class. Almost to the brink of sleep now, she lay thinking of the school's reopening a few weeks ago , and the students that had returned for the first time since the battle. Students, funnily enough, which included Harry, Hermione and Ron. Despite all they'd been through, they needed both their seventh year O.W.L's and their N.E.W.T's to be able to enter the workforce and start their careers. And for the moment, everything seemed perfect. Although in the wizarding world, as one knows, things are hardly ever as they seem to be...

**As always, review, review, review! See how quickly I wrote AND uploaded this chapter? 'Writeus Moreus' - an effective spell if I do say so myself! Although the strength depends on the caster :) CAST AWAY!**


	3. Chapter 2: Merlin's Multiples!

Her stomach churned violently, and for one horrifying moment, Minerva thought she might be ill all over the professor's table in the Great Hall during breakfast.

A mixture of annoyance and fatigue flitted across her features before she composed herself once more and concentrated on forcing down at least a piece of dry toast. This weakness in constitution was beginning to perturb her, normally her health was ironclad, and she was rarely ill.

Well, she thought to herself, perhaps it wouldn't hurt to miss a meal. Only a month or so into the term and already the rich food was causing her robes to fit a bit more tightly. Part of getting older perhaps, she added wryly. Though she had to admit, the weight gain was odd. Minerva McGonagall's weight had never fluctuated more than two pounds either way since her thirty fifth birthday. Fast forward forty or so years and here she sat, though she was just at the age where a witch could start to be considered middle age. She brushed off the errant thought as she focused on mentally running through the classes she had for the day. Heaven help her, seventh year Slytherin and Gryffindor transfiguration classes first AND last period, she'd need something stronger than pumpkin juice to get through that.

"Minerva," Albus' voice broke through her mental preparation. "Are you feeling well? You've seemed a bit off colour the last week or so. Are you ill?"

"I'm fine, Albus," she snapped rather irritably. "Don't fuss. I'm sure that all I'm suffering from is a very mild cold."

"You'll still see Poppy after your last class," he continued, his tone low so that no one else could hear him.

"Really Albus, you're acting ridiculously…"

"I apologize, my dear, but it seems to me that right after I've returned from the dead I don't want you popping off either!" he countered.

"I am not planning on 'popping off' as you so elegantly put it, anytime soon. And in a hundred years or so, when I do pass on, I tend to do so with much more dignity than simply 'popping off' would afford me!"

He chuckled at this, but still lay a hand on her thigh until she met his eyes. "Please, Minerva?"

That final please undid her and she sighed, rolling her eyes at the ceiling of the great hall; which today was charmed to mimic the weather outside, cloudy and overcast.

"Fine, Albus. I'll go and see Poppy at the end of they day. Now stop fussing! I didn't make it public knowledge that we were together after you were dead, so no one knows now."

"Such a shame, don't you think?" Cerulean eyes crackled with sexual electricity that all but sent a current up her spine as she shivered deliciously at his tone of voice.

"Must I transfigure you into an ice cube again so you cool off?"

Not to be outdone, Albus lowered his voice even further. "Anything to be between your lips, my dear... In any form that bears no punishment."

Trying to disguise her sudden arousal, she flicked a look of disdain Albus' way; but he wasn't taken in by it. Not when the corners of her lips quirked up like that and the emerald eyes that flashed up at him did so more out of desire than of annoyance.

However, after her first class Minerva was feeling worse than ever as she dismissed the fourth year Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws. She had a free period now, and instead of using the time to return to her office and grade papers, she found her feet taking her toward the infirmary. After very nearly being sick all over Dennis Creevey's transfigured toad, she decided it would be best to get the visit over with and get back to normal. This whole being unwell thing was really very tiresome.

"Madam Pomfrey?" Minerva called out to the infirmary, surprisingly empty of students. Although really, most students did wait until the first month was over before faking ill and performing hexes on one another in order to be let out of class. The biggest shareholders of 'Weasely's Wizarding Wheezes' no doubt was primarily made up of the underage witches and wizards of Hogwarts. Oh, and Albus of course. She smiled wryly at that last thought, she'd known him since she was 16, a student herself, and in the time that had passed his inner child still hadn't aged even a year.

"Minerva, what on earth are you doing in here?" her old school friend came out of her office incredulously.

"Normally, Albus or I have to drag you in here hissing and clawing or unconscious!" the mediwitch came over to Minerva and conjured a chart, which fell neatly into her hand.

"I just don't know what's wrong with me, Poppy. I just cannot shake this flu! It took so much out of me that I didn't even transfigure for my students the first day of school…Come to think of it, I've been so drained I haven't used my Animagus form since the summer."

Poppy pursed her lips and magically pulled up one of the cots, locking the infirmary doors as she did so with a sign that read 'back in 20 min.' Seeing Minerva's arched brow she smiled wryly. "I figure the sniffling masses can wait a few moments, jokes aside the fact that you're here at all other than for a social call has me a little concerned, Min."

"I told you, I'm fine, I'm sure of it. I just need a little boost or a Pepper-Up potion or something of the like."

"Hmm, we'll see about that. Come on now, lie back on the cot."

Minerva opened her mouth to protest that she didn't need to, but one look at the stern expression on her friend's face was enough to silence any argument she was about to make and lay back.

"Infirmitate Revelata, Corpus Dolor, Seperata Opus", beams of pale blue and yellow lights washed over the professor's body, but appeared to reveal nothing out of the ordinary.

Poppy's face whitened, but still she continued to cast the different healing and diagnostic spells.

"Poppy…" Minerva's voice was low and scared now. "If you can't find the simple source of this, I assume you've considered the fact we may be dealing with a curse."

"I'm not finished yet, Minerva… I want to look at this on a cellular level, this may burn slightly love."

She drew her wand against a patch of skin on Minerva's arm, and they both watched as a drop of blood from the area glowed blue and rose before expanding mid-air.

Murmuring and counting under her breath as she whisked away the different layers of cells, she stopped at the third layer, which to Minerva appeared to be a series of octagonal platelets with rounded corners that had a purplish tinge to the normal red colour. At this, Madam Pomfrey stopped, and the vision began to fade. But coming to her senses, she waved her wand again with a muttered 'Statis Visio' and the dissipating image returned full force. After another careful moment of consideration, Poppy cleared the picture and healed the wound on her patient's arm.

"For Merlin's sake, Poppy, just tell me what the matter is! Good Lord, from the expression on your face I'm beginning to think I'm going to drop dead in the next thirty seconds!" She tried to joke, hoping to mask her own fear that echoed what she saw on her friend's face."

But slowly, the shock on Poppy Pomfrey's face turned to a wide, beaming smile and she threw her arms around her friend. Minerva patted her on the back awkwardly wondering what on earth had gotten into her old, level-headed friend. "Erm, Poppy, dear, would you like to explain to the patient - what on earth you could possibly be smiling about?"

"Min, I need you to be calm about this. Now obviously, you have resumed your relationship with Albus. Merlin, that man adores you Minerva. If I weren't your best friend I'd be absolutely green with envy."

"If you do not tell me this very instant WHAT is going on with my body, you may very well end up green, Persephone Pomfrey!"

"Don't you EVER call me that again, Minerva. If you weren't with child, I would hex you right now. But as I was saying, hiding the relationship between the two of you is going to prove much more difficult now that there are four of you!"

But Minerva McGonagall was still stuck on the first part of her friend's statement. "P-Poppy, I cannot have heard you correctly, what child are you talking about?"

"The ones in your belly, love," Madam Pomfrey replied beaming, her eyes sparkling as she waited for Minerva to process the other half of her statement.

Amazingly, Minerva stopped sputtering and slowly lay back down on the bed, one trembling hand over her face. For a moment, Poppy thought her friend's reaction was caused by horror at the news she had just given her. But as Minerva sat up once again, her hand moved shakily from her face to her belly and her expression turned to one of tremulous, exultant joy.

"Please, don't be joking Poppy…"

"I'm not, I'm not Min, I swear it. You're having twins, love! Eight weeks along apparently too."

Rare tears sprang to her eyes as Minerva started to let herself believe in the two, tiny lives that rested beneath her heart.

"I th-thought I wasn't able, a-after…"

She would never know if she could have been happy with Dougal, her first love and muggle fiancé, the thought of what might have been still plagued her some nights as she lay in bed alone. If only he'd been a wizard, or had there been some way to tell him she was a witch without breaking the Statute of Secrecy…but there hadn't been, and even then, still in her youth Minerva had known that you couldn't be happy without being free to be yourself, and having someone love you for who you were and not the façade you put up.

Unfortunately, even back in the wizarding world, that façade had simply turned into a wall after her heart was broken, and there was never anyone strong enough, or willing enough to break through that wall to get to her, rescue her from herself. That is, until Albus Dumbledore came into her life; and like the phoenix of his Patronus, brought back to life what she thought had died so long ago, and rekindled the fire in her heart.

Likewise, her brief marriage to her former boss, Elphinstone Urquhart. After his fourth proposal, she had finally accepted, and they had spent three pleasant years together before his untimely death from a Venomous Tentacula bite. She was fond of him, he had been a good man, but not even in those years of marriage did she feel as bound to him as she did to Albus so much so that her body flamed with the thought of him.

Her biggest regret was that during their marriage, she hadn't had any children. They had tried, Merlin, she tried – but her body seemed to refuse to conceive a child. Elphinstone hadn't been overly concerned. He was a good deal older than her and would be content if things stayed the same between them. It was Minerva who had so desperately wanted a child that she felt a pang low in her belly each time she saw an infant on the street.

She drank countless potions and cast endless charms to enhance her fertility and strengthen the chances of her becoming pregnant, but to no avail, after three years her womb remained as painfully barren as it ever had been. And with the death of her husband, her chances to have the baby she so longed for died also.

It had taken years for her to accept that she would never be a mother, and she threw herself into teaching, focusing her attention on the children in Hogwarts to whom the teachers were a sort of surrogate parent as they lived away from home for the first time in their lives. When she and Dumbledore had finally consummated the relationship that had begun in her seventh year at Hogwarts, having a baby was only a fantasy she sometimes brought out from the back of her mind. Between Voldemort's rising army and the stringent rules of the Ministry of Magic, she and Albus had to keep their coupling a complete and utter secret. Aberforth, Dumbledore's brother, and her best friends and fellow staff Poppy Pomfrey and Rolanda Hooch were the only ones who knew of the illicit relationship.

"Oh, Poppy, I'm going to be a mother…After all these years!" she mused, her hands still cradling her abdomen protectively.

Poppy smiled, "You're not exactly ancient, Minerva. You're only 75, and for the most part a witch's childbearing years taper off around 90, even a hundred. And love, for all you know, it could have been Elphinstone that was sterile, and not you all along. He had no children and he was quite a bit older than you when you married him."

"Oh Poppy, a baby!" her friend continued, uncharacteristically misty eyed and dizzy with awe at what she'd just found out.

But ever pragmatic, she finally came back down to earth, literally – she had managed to somehow levitate an inch off the cot before Poppy had gently pulled her back down and made her lie back once more so that she could feel her abdomen.

"Its early days yet, Min, you know that. But so far, everything looks to be going well. Your uterus is just below the halfway point to reaching your navel and the walls seem firm.

You know you'll need to take it easy, right? Although you're a good twenty years away from menopause, you're still not a young witch. And your body has taken enough spells and hexes and abuse to last every one of your nine lifetimes!" she teased her friend about the characteristics of her Animagus form.

"I'll start on a potion you can take to help with the nausea, don't worry it won't hurt the babies," she added quickly, seeing Minerva's expression. "Albus is going to be over the moon!"

"I hope so," Minerva mused, suddenly much more nervous about the future.

"Course he will. And I'll see you every week to check your progress, unless you feel ANY cramping or bleeding then you call me straightaway or get to St. Mungo's. I don't want to scare you Min, but this isn't going to be easy, carrying the babies to term and delivering healthy. Most miscarriages if they happen, occur within the first trimester. So for the next 4 weeks, if not the next 9 months, you are under orders from me and I'm sure Albus as well, to lead a life of relative leisure. Understood?"

**Your reviews truly do mean the world to me, I'm not joking in the slightest when I say the review I just got spurred me on to write an extra 1200 or so words and allow me to upload this chapter (despite a temperature of 98 degrees, think I ate some of Fred and George's Fever Fudge or gave myself a Bat Bogey Hex, the flu is so bothersome... Although, it does give me an excuse to get more writing done as I'm stuck to my couch!)**

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	4. Chapter 3: Blithering, Bumbling & Babies

"Erm, Professor McGonagall?" Hermione raised her hand tentatively, not having the slightest clue what to expect when her teacher and mentor responded.

Aberrantly, Minerva had been daydreaming during her last class, and unknowingly had been twirling her wand errantly at the side of the room, which was rapidly filling with blue and pink bubbles. She had been wondering whether the babies would be boy or girl, maybe two girls, perhaps two boys; which accounted for the double layered bubbles she was so absentmindedly conjuring, of pink and pink, blue and blue.

As Hermione's voice broke through her fantasies and inner soliloquy on the gender of the fetuses, Minerva visibly started at the sight of the shimmering pastel orbs gently bouncing and popping about – and blushing terribly when she realized that she herself was the cause of them. "Oh! My… Evanesco!"

Completely mortified at her behaviour, she turned to the class sharply, all of whom were staring at their usually morbidly sensible teacher. "Am I to presume then, that all of you have finished your two rolls of parchment on the effects of Polyjuice potion on transfigured persons? No? I'd get to it then seeing as you've wasted the rest of your class time. Dismissed!"

As usual, Ron, Harry and Hermione were the last to leave the classroom, seeing as Hermione insisted on sitting in the very front. But as they left, Harry could have sworn he heard a faint embarrassed sounding groan of 'Oh god…' coming from the direction of McGonagall's desk.

"Something's up with her for sure," Ron remarked as Harry rejoined them outside the classroom doors. "First, she walks around looking like death for the last two weeks, and now she's smiling and distracted and conjuring up bubbles? I think she's gone mad!"

"Oh Ronald!" Hermione hit him lightly over the head with her completed rolls of parchment. "She is NOT mad, I'm sure there's a…"

"Perfectly logical explanation!" Harry and Ron both chorused laughingly, knowing what was about to come out of Hermione's mouth.

Now it was Hermione's turn to blush furiously. Ron put an arm around her waist and ducked round her hair to kiss her.

"While you two might be satiating your hunger this way, I'm actually rather hungry. I'm off to find Ginny before dinner, I'll see you there then will I?"

Ron and Hermione gave no response as they were both suddenly otherwise occupied with their impromptu snogging session.

Minerva was an absolute wreck at dinner, despite her renewed appetite now that the queasiness had abated, she could hardly wait to be done with her meal so she and Albus could retire to their quarters for the evening.

After the second time she was asked if she was alright, first by Albus and then by Rolanda, she excused herself early from the meal and went up to the room.

Quickly, she showered and dried her hair – keeping it loose around her shoulders as she changed into a deep green velvet dressing gown that she cinched tightly around her waist.

She heard Albus at the door, a quarter of an hour later, and suddenly she felt as though she were frozen to the spot in the middle of the room where she'd been pacing back and forth, anticipating his arrival.

Her mind ran rampant in the several seconds it took for him to speak the password and open the door to their rooms. What if his reaction to the news of the pregnancy was one of horror? For all the years they'd been together they had always been careful to avoid something like this, with various contraception charms and potions. They hadn't ever discussed children, but it was an unspoken truth that having them together was too dangerous, first with the battle against Grindenwald and then with the second rising of the Dark Lord. And then of course, her fated marriage had happened in between the two.

But of course, Minerva hadn't bothered to cast any of the usual charms on herself after Albus' death. There had been no need. The moment the fatal beam had hit his chest, Minerva knew unequivocally that there would never be anyone else. And after his unexpected return a month after the final battle, their coupling had been so much more than a fulfillment of sexual need.

_Minerva woke in the middle of the night, reaching out instantly to the other side of the bed to see if it had been nothing but a dream; a glorious, beautiful, cruel dream. _

_But her hand had hit solid, warm, flesh and tears once more filled her eyes. "I'm still here, Min. Oh love, it's alright. I'm here, I'm here Tabby," his hands had soothed over her back as she cried softly out of relief. _

_After a moment, Minerva had looked up. Her hands, which had been on the expanse of his chest moved to bring his head down closer to hers. Albus felt her lips tremble beneath his, and he kissed her more strongly, as if trying to prove to her that he was flesh and blood and not merely an apparition that would float away. _

_She straddled him then, not breaking the kiss and shrugged off the rest of her robes before starting on his. Albus watched as the small, white hands pushed the fabric of his own robes off his shoulders, and her lips continued their trail down his neck and shoulders. _

_He had been about to speak then and tell her that she was far too exhausted and that she should get some rest. But the desperate, still almost wounded look in her eyes cut him through to the core and he joined in equal worship of her body, wanting to heal in her what was broken. _

He had been so heartbreakingly tender and gentle with her that night, Minerva mused as the object of her thoughts and affections came through the door. And yet he'd given her back the strength that she had thought she'd lost in the aftermath of the battle. And now more than ever, she needed that strength as she prepared to bring twins into world, and inform the unknowing father to be of their impending arrival.

"Minerva, what on earth is all this about? Apparently you were distracted in class today, you absolutely flew through dinner and Poppy refuses to tell me a damn thing! Darling, I'm worried!"

"What's wrong and why have you been so ill for the last fortnight?"

The usually unflappable pair of professors stood a few feet apart and Albus stared in growing dismay as Minerva took up pacing again and wringing her hands. "Oh this is foolish, I'll just tell you. It's bound to get out soon enough and…"

Albus caught her lightly by the shoulders, "Whatever it is, Min, I'm here. We'll find a cure for whatever it is, I swear it."

"I doubt you'll find a cure for the next seven months," she supplied wryly.

"Se-seven months? That's all the time you have?" Albus started to speak, getting progressively more upset as he went on.

"No, no, no, that's not what I mean at all! God, I've never felt like such a blithering idiot in my life. What I am trying and failing miserably to tell you…is that, I'm to have a baby." Minerva's voice had grown progressively softer as she spoke.

Albus looked at the tall, slender figure standing in the middle of the carpet, looking at him fearfully – two emerald orbs full of doubt though her back was as straight and proud as ever. And slowly, the words she had just spoken began to filter through his mind, rendering him completely and utterly speechless.

A baby. Minerva was pregnant…He was going to be a father. Oh, Merlin a baby!"

Breaking suddenly out of his inner reverie, Albus flew across the room to where she stood and twirled her around, laughing. "A baby!" he repeated, "Min, you're going to have a baby! WE'RE going to have a baby! Oh my darling, are you all right? What did Poppy say? Are you well? Is the baby alright?"

"Babies," came her tearful, laughing response as Albus placed her gently back on the ground as though she would break with the slightest touch. "Twins, Albus."

Overcome, the older wizard closed his eyes for a moment as he took in this information before dropping to his knees and parting the emerald folds of her dressing gown to reveal the taut, pale belly that would soon begin to swell with their children.

Reverently, he lowered his head to press his lips to warm, yielding flesh not once, but twice, causing Minerva's eyes to well up once more as the man she loved held her gently by the hips and acknowledged the presence of his children.

He stood once more, and Minerva noted that his eyes looked bluer and brighter than she had ever seen them before. The cerulean iris sparkling and flashing with electricity.

Without warning he swept her up into his arms, bridal style and carried her over to their shared four poster bed. "The mother of my children should NOT be on her feet," he proclaimed as he set her down after magically turning back the comforter.

"Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, I swear if you start treating me like fragile porcelain this early on in the process I will transfigure you into a mouse before my first trimester is over!" Her voice was stern, but her eyes twinkled happily as he set himself down beside her.

"My apologies, my love, I'll do my best." Once more, Albus untied the belt from her green velvet robes, this time placing a warm hand on her tummy which she covered with her own.

After a moment of pleasurable, contented silence, Minerva spoke up. "So you're not…upset? I know we didn't plan this and neither of us are exactly the age when most people start a family and there's still so much that's uncertain now that Voldemort is gone and…"

Albus kissed her again to shut her up. "My Tabby is having kittens, I'm thrilled Minerva. Truly…absolutely petrified and will undoubtedly remain so until you give birth, but so so happy. Thank you, my darling."

"Mmm," Minerva curled up into his side again and sighed happily as her eyes closed. Exhausted from the days events, she fell asleep almost instantly. But Albus stayed awake for the next hour, simply watching her sleep, something he had often done before but without the same sense of awe he had now at the thought that her body and her breath were sustaining three lives now, instead of one. And thinking of how gladly he would give up his own body and soul to protect what lay so peacefully in his arms.

**Okay, I admit, this is a little sappy. But come on, they are just so damn cute together! I really hope you guys are enjoying the story, there's a lot more that's going to be done with it!**

**And thank you so much for the reviews! Especially the extra-lovely long ones I've received. Keep it up! I'm not sure I've ever updated a story with this kind of insane frequency before. **

**Leave me some love to wake up to tomorrow morning! Although if you don't I might actually get some work done on 'The theory of transcendentalism as it applies to the efforts of heroism in Huckleberry Finn'. But I'd much rather be writing MMAD than madly writing a university paper!**

**Cheers!**


	5. Chapter 4: To be Continued?

**Fear not, I'm still alive! A miserable ball of flu, but alive for the moment. So I KNOW this 'chapter' is short, but if I didn't cut if off here it would run over 3000 words - and my usual wordcount for stories is around 1600 - so this fic is already an anomaly in and of itself.**

**So review! And motivate my fevered mind to transcribe my scribblings into the computer, allowing me to update... Read on!**

However, as the pregnancy progressed into its eleventh week, Minerva was beginning to feel less and less like her old self as the physical aspects of childbearing began to take their toll. The queasiness she felt in the mornings and every other hour of the day hadn't let up as she neared the end of her first trimester, and she was so bone achingly tired by her last class each day that she'd even managed to sleep through dinner once or twice, Albus not having the heart to wake her and instead bringing up a plate or asking the house elves to make one up for her.

"Here's the potion you'll need to take daily for the pregnancy. It contains all the vitamins you'll be needing now as well as various herbs magic or otherwise." Poppy Pomfrey pressed the vial of potion into her friend's hand as she came into the hospital wing for her weekly check-in.

"He knows then?"

"Minnie, he needed the essence of your aura for the potion to work its best…Severus won't say a word until you do concerning the matter. He may be an utter bucket of tripe at times, but you know he's a gentleman at heart."

"I'm just so scared, Poppy. So many things could go wrong…" lost in unpleasant thought, Minerva walked the few steps over to the window, her hand, not unnoticed by the sharp eyes of Madam Pomfrey, slipping to the flat plane of her belly as if to cradle the little life within that Poppy knew Minerva already loved more than anything else in the world.

"Where's Albus?"

"Hmm? Oh, yet another Ministry meeting. They're still working on appointing new witches and wizards to the cabinet in the muggle and Wizarding governments and committees. He left first thing this morning after he'd got a ministry owl; 5 o' clock in the morning! I would've been tempted to strangle him if he hadn't looked so worried. But of course he didn't say anything. Honestly, Poppy, it's been three weeks since I've told him and he's still treating me as if I'm glass when he's not bouncing off the walls in excitement. You'd think I was the first witch in history to give birth by the way he's acting."

Poppy just chuckled as she wrapped a blood pressure cuff around Minerva's arm.

Minerva sighed impatiently as Madam Pomfrey worked. "Really Poppy, is there no faster way of doing this? There's no spell you can cast along the lines of 'Protecto the pregnant woman'?" She asked this in jest of course, but part of her was sick to death of all the tests she'd had to go through.

"Magic's a funny thing, Minerva. You know that better than most. You're just as human and fragile as a non-magic person. There are simply more potions and spells available to us…pregnancy and childbirth are still things that must be done as naturally as possible, even in the Wizarding world. Unfortunately, they're also some of the most dangerous."

She put the cuff and her wand down, "Well, everything looks to be in order. When do you plan on telling the rest of the staff and school?"

Minerva groaned, "I really don't want to…Though I'll admit it's getting harder to hide this belly." She laughed and pressed both hands against her rounding belly, outlining the small bulge before arranging her robes once more.

"Yes, I fear it will have to be sooner than later, Min. At some point you'll have to let the cat out of the bag!" At this, Poppy doubled over laughing at her own joke until tears ran down her face.

Minerva just rolled her eyes and chuckled wryly. Once Poppy had sobered again, she fixed her nurses cap and eyed Minerva shrewdly. "Although, my darling, despite the kittens you're not gaining as much weight as you should be. I'd like to see you try and get a little more down at mealtimes."

"Getting it down isn't the problem, Pops. It's keeping it down that's the bugger…" Minerva swore mildly as she left the hospital wing, not knowing she would be back in a couple hours under very different circumstances.

**Oh dear, that doesn't sound very good does it? What's going to happen? If something happens who will be there now that Albus is in a meeting with the Wizengamot? Ooooh...better review!**


	6. Chapter 5: An Inevitable Collapse

**Anyone else's FF account going insane last night? Tried to post this then and was horrified when there were no review messages in my inbox this morning! I thought you'd all abandoned the 'ship'!**

**Anyway, this chapter is technically a continuance of the last one. But as you can see, even splitting it as I did, this is still an insanely ridiculously long chapter in regards to word count. My average update for any of my fics is around 1600. This is TWICE that! Does this mean I can have twice as many reviews? **

**And to those who thought the title of the last chapter meant I wouldn't be continuing THE STORY. Never fear! It was simply a tongue in cheek/play on words in reference to whether the babies/Minerva's happiness/relationship would continue on despite the cliffie.**

** Curious? Read on and review!**

Minerva sat down heavily once she got to her classroom; not even bothering to go down to the great hall for breakfast. She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes, exhaling loudly as she braced herself for the long day ahead of her.

Heaven help her, seventh year Slytherin and Gryffindor transfiguration classes first AND last period, she'd need something stronger than pumpkin juice to get through that.

Eurgh, the thought of food in any form was enough to upset her already queasy tummy. "Oh Kittens," she murmured tiredly, her eyes still closed, "wouldn't you like to give Mummy a little break this morning?" Beneath her robes, she pressed a hand to her belly. It hadn't yet ripened to a noticeable curve but she could feel the thickening of her waist and the new firmness of skin and muscle that rounded ever so slightly, signifying the presence of her baby.

Wishing she was far along enough to feel them, she straightened up in her chair and resumed her preternaturally perfect posture. With five minutes to go before the warning bell, her stomach started grumbling, which in turn of course set off another round of nausea. "Oh now you're hungry? Alright, poppets if you promise to let mummy keep it down I'll go get something from the kitchens after first class."

Smiling, she gave her rounded tummy a final pat before the seventh years arrived. Minerva McGonagall never would have thought she would be caught doing something as foolish as talking to her belly to unborn babies. But Albus had been at it from the get go, and now she too found herself narrating her activities and thoughts when she was alone, and she'd come to cherish those times she had to connect with her children.

However the smile was wiped off her face as the first of the seventh year Slytherins entered through the massive double oak doors and her stomach flip flopped disconcertingly as they did, causing bitter bile to rise up in the back of her throat.

She rubbed absently at her chest to soothe the heartburn it caused before addressing the now full class, as both houses had now arrived and were seated, somewhat, expectantly.

As she lectured, Hermione was studying her with a worried expression pinching her features as she took in her professor's greyish pallor and peaked appearance. Amazingly, even Ron noticed the sickly cast of their teacher and stopped his one ended discussion with Harry about the Chudley Cannons seeker trading with the HolyHead Harpies.

"Oi, she does look a sight, dun she?" Ron whispered. Hermione, who'd been biting her lip anxiously spoke up as well.

"She doesn't look well at all. I wonder if Dumbledore knows, if he did she certainly wouldn't be teaching…"

"Why'd he want to know McGonagall was ill?"

"Honestly, Ron. I love you deeply, but you're a complete and utter troll when it comes to human emotions. Remember when you told me you thought Cho was going to explode because no one could possibly be thinking of more than two things at one time?"

Harry hadn't said anything for the last several minutes, but was watching the professor carefully out of the corner of his eye as he too sensed something off in her behaviour.

He watched in growing horror as the slender, pale-looking woman touched her temple lightly, as though she was dizzy, the other hand reaching out to steady herself on her desk as she swayed slightly, as though her knees would give out.

The sight was so completely aberrant and disconcertingly un-McGonagall-like that she had already started to fall before he'd left his chair.

"Professor!"

Minerva blinked hard in the hopes her head would stop swimming and her vision would clear as she continued lecturing, albeit in embarrassingly faltering tones, on the more refined points of human transfiguration. Her stomach roiled again, sending another surge of sickness into her throat, and suddenly every limb seemed too impossibly heavy to bear and she couldn't quite feel her feet on the ground as blackness started to blur the corners of her vision.

The class watched in dismay as her lithe frame twisted gracefully as she crumpled to the floor.

Hermione gave an anguished cry as she stood; knocking her chair over backwards as she quickly cast a spell to conjure a pillow at the professor's feet to cushion her fall.

Despite his year off the Quidditch pitch, Harry had spent much of the summer on the Weasely's playing field behind their newly rebuilt cottage; and his seeker reflexes didn't fail him as he leapt over the desks he'd just been sitting at a second before, and dove, catching Professor McGonagall's limp form in his arms before she hit the ground.

Carefully, Harry lowered the unconscious woman to the ground as Hermione and Ron ran up to the front of the class.

"Alright then, class dismissed everybody out!" Ron waved the curious body of students, Gryffindor and Slytherin alike, towards the doors. "And someone run and tell Madam Pomfrey we'll be bringing her up in a moment once she comes round. Alright, I said go! Give her some air, nothing to see here; go on, the lot of you!"

Hermione was kneeling beside the professor and brought her hand out from beneath her robes to check her pulse. Her belly was slightly but quite noticeably swollen beneath the voluminous, bulky robes that as yet did much to hide her changing figure and Hermione cautiously placed the flat of her hand against the swell as she knelt beside her unconscious professor.

"Oh my God…" Hermione breathed, her expression turning to one of shock for the second time in the space of two minutes. She looked up at Harry and Ron, both who still looked utterly clueless as they tried unsuccessfully rousing the unconscious witch. "Oh professor…"

"We've got to get her to Madam Pomfrey immediately," Hermione declared; the authoritarian tone of her voice returning as she gave out the order.

"She's going to hate being carried through the school like this," Harry pointed out grimly.

Ron's head shot up, "Oi Harry, you got your invisibility cloak on you then?"

"What? Oh yeah, I do. Habit…" Harry rummaged around in his knapsack, scattering broken quills and scraps of parchment over the stone floor until his fingers came in contact with the slippery, silver mass of transparent fabric that had served him so well in the past, and coincidentally was the only remaining third of the Deathly Hallows.

"Are we okay to move her, Hermione?"

"I think so," the younger witch mused anxiously as Harry lifted McGonagall into his arms. "Oh, but Harry, be careful of her be-" Hermione caught herself, "Erm…head. She might have banged her head."

Ron gave her an odd look as he helped her up off the floor. "Harry caught her before she hit the floor, Hermione. You sure you didn't hit your head? Bloody good save mate." Ron turned to his friend and clapped him on the shoulder. Hermione let out a sigh of relief at the distraction from her almost slip.

Ron and Hermione walked in front of Harry so that no one would notice his awkward gait for the invisible woman he was carrying. It had been less than 10 minutes since Minerva had first collapsed, and already the news had spread around the castle, and anyone within it, living or dead, knew that Professor McGonagall had fainted dead away during first class by the time they entered the hospital wing.

Madam Pomfrey met them at the doors and hurriedly ushered them in to a private corner, where drapes that had been charmed with 'Muffliato' spell hung around the bed.

"Out! All of you, go on!" Madam Pomfrey shooed them out without taking her gaze off of her patient. "Oh Min…" Poppy sighed as she took in the sickly pallor and pale figure of her best friend.

However, the trio didn't move. "We're not leaving her," Harry said coldly, his eyes still fixed on the unconscious woman who had become a second mother and a mentor to him.

The mediwitch's expression softened slightly, "You can come back in as soon as I'm done examining her. However I do not believe Professor McGonagall, even in unconsciousness, would be in favour of your seeing her disrobed.

Ron and Harry's faces flushed a deep red at this, and even the tips of Hermione's ears turned pink as she pulled the other two out from the curtains.

Hermione opened her mouth to ask Ron to send an owl off to Dumbledore to let him know, but he spoke up first, seeing as he knew Harry and Hermione wouldn't be leaving McGonagall's side any time soon.

"I'll just go off and send an owl through to the ministry. Perhaps if dad gets it, he can get a copy to Dumbledore quicker than if the owl is intercepted getting through to one of those god-awful cabinet meetings. Give her my regards when she comes round, eh?"

Hermione grabbed Ron and kissed him senseless before releasing her grasp on his robes. "You are wonderful, Ronald Bilius Weasely."

Ron, who was looking slightly shell-shocked at this point, merely lifted a hand in farewell as he stumbled out the infirmary doors.

"Min-Minerva, wake up for me love. Come on, rise and shine." Poppy's bright voice pierced through the fog in Minerva's head until she was forced to open her eyes to confront the awful racket.

"There we are." Poppy slowed the potion IV drip and watched as the woman regained consciousness.

"Poppy? Where, what am I doing in the hospital wing?" Minerva's face whitened as she attempted to sit up too quickly and wilted back against the pillows. "The babies?" she touched her stomach and looked up at her friend with undisguised fear in her eyes.

Poppy smoothed a stray lock of hair back from her friend's face. "Shh, they're alright Min. The babies are alright," she soothed the frantic mother-to-be. "It's you I'm not so sure about."

"Nonsense, I'm fine; just got a little light-headed." Reassured that the babies were alright, Minerva allowed herself to sink back into the all too welcoming embrace of the hospital bed, aided by the firm hand of Poppy Pomfrey.

"What happened?" she asked again, softly, letting her eyes close as Poppy gently stroked her hair.

"You fainted during first class, love. Harry, Ron and Hermione just brought you in a few minutes ago."

Minerva groaned, letting her head fall back in dramatic fashion, making the mediwitch at her side very nervous.

"Are you in pain love?" She placed her hands on the other witch's belly, feeling around the swell gently. "All the tests on the babies came back in normal ranges."

"No, no, Poppy, nothing like that." Minerva was quick to assure her friend. "No more than usual at least. But I'm sure the entire school is abuzz now with news of what happened," she chuckled bitterly, her eyes still closed.

Suddenly, the vividly green eyes flew open once more, "Albus! Oh Poppy, do you suppose anyone's told him? Oh of course they have. Merlin, he's going to be worse than ever after this." She coughed lightly and Poppy lifted a glass from the bedside table and held her wand over it, murmuring 'Aguamenti' before handing it over to Minerva who took it gratefully.

"Now Min, you fainted as a result of several factors. You're extremely dehydrated," she gestured to the water glass Minerva was gulping thirstily from. "I'm assuming because of the persistent morning sickness and subsequent vomiting. And judging from the abdominal scan of your stomach contents I've just done, there are none. You put this together with stress and fatigue, you get a sudden drop in low blood pressure and we have one very wan-looking witch on our hands."

She leaned in closer, and took Minerva's hands in hers. "You can't run on empty like you used to anymore, Min. Not if you want to keep these babies in your belly and you out of the hospital." She stood after checking the self adjusting chart at the foot of the bed.

"Now I believe you have two very worried people who have been hovering outside for the last twenty minutes since they brought you in."

Poppy smiled and held the curtain open for the pair before slipping out herself.

Seeing it was Harry and Hermione, Minerva smiled and held out her hands, which they took gratefully as they pulled up seats at her bedside.

"Professor, are you alright?" Hermione's words came tumbling out her mouth as she tried to hold back the tears that threatened in the corner of her eyes. "Y-you went so pale and then you collapsed…"

"And I want to thank you for saving me from what I presume would have been a very nasty fall," Minerva cut in gently.

"I transfigured a pillow, but it was Harry who managed to catch you before you hit the ground," Hermione explained.

But before Minerva could respond, the thundering tones of Albus Dumbledore broke through the charmed bedside perimeter, preceding the source by only a few moments as a much disheveled looking Dumbledore threw the drapes open, in frantic search for the woman he loved and the children she God willing, still carried.

Unseeing or uncaring of their presence, he swept by Harry and Hermione before setting himself down gingerly on the side of the bed Harry had been on and carefully running his hands over Minerva's head and arms, as if checking for any signs of external damage before lifting it tenderly to her cheek, on which she gratefully rested it for a moment with a soft sigh.

"Min," his voice cracked slightly, and the absolute, unadulterated love and adoration the younger witch and wizard saw in their eyes and expressions was so powerful, so potent, that they had to look away.

He pressed his lips to her forehead before drawing back the covers to cradle the swell their children made.

"Everyone's alright, Albus, I swear it," Minerva assured him as he lifted her hand to his lips.

Another smile broke across her normally stern face as if the sun had lit it from within, and she cleared her throat before speaking once more to address the room, or curtained area as it may be.

She looked over at Hermione first, "Am I correct, Miss Granger, in assuming that even before Albus' revealing behaviour that you guessed what I am about to tell you?"

Now it was Hermione's turn to blush and she let out a very uncharacteristic squeal. "I am SO happy for you, Professor McGonagall! And…Professor Dumbledore."

"Anyone like to clue me in here?" Harry's bewildered voice came from the foot of the bed where he'd been relegated to when Albus had arrived, bowling him over in his hurry to get to Minerva. By this point, he'd guessed the two were together, but he hadn't a clue as to what Hermione was congratulating the woman on, seeing she had just fainted.

Minerva just smiled gently, "I'm pregnant, Harry…with twins," she added with a further smile at the beaming young witch beside her.

The deep tones of a gong or church bell rang out from Albus' rather peculiar wristwatch and he shut if off with weary sigh. "Bloody Wizengamot wants me back already, they can't figure out why the Headmaster of Hogwarts came rushing back from London to see one his staff who had 'simply fainted' as they put it." His expression was wry as he kept Minerva's fingers entwined in his.

"Go Albus, you have to go. Merlin knows who they'll try and elect without you there. You heard what Poppy said, I'll be fine."

"Actually my dear, what I heard her say was that you needed to rest and to take care of yourself. And seeing as you're not particularly fond of either of those two things I don't like the idea of leaving you alone. At least not today when you've just come out of the hospital wing…Hmm, I wonder if Poppy has enough to room to keep you here until I'm back."

"No, Albus. Absolutely not!" Minerva's voice was firm, but she looked up at him afterwards, emerald green pools looking up at him beseechingly. "I just want to go home, to our rooms. I hate being here, or in hospitals in general."

Albus sighed heavily, "I could call up one of the house elves to stay with you I suppose."

Minerva groaned again and Hermione, who'd been watching the heated exchange silently spoke up in a tentative voice after glancing at Harry and getting his nod of approval.

"Professors… Harry and I would be more than happy to stay with Professor McGonagall for the afternoon. Transfiguration class is obviously cancelled anyway and I've already done the readings for my other course. If, if that's alright with her of course," Hermione nodded in deference to the tired looking witch.

"My luck with house elves, I'd feel better if we were the ones with you," Harry added wryly.

Albus looked at Minerva, who nodded. "Thank you both, very much. This should keep Albus from being too much a wreck at the Wizengamot meetings this afternoon."

"I'd like Poppy to check Minerva and the babies once more before she's released. Let's say to meet at the entrance to my,' he corrected himself, "our chambers in a half hour?"

The pair nodded and left to gather their school things and McGonagall's bag of lesson plans they'd abandoned in the Transfiguration class in the aftermath of Minerva's collapse.

Once they were gone, Albus moved in closer to Minerva's side and she nestled further into his arms.

"You scared me, my love," Albus spoke softly as he held her.

Minerva sighed thoughtfully and nodded, "I scared myself today," she admitted. "But now I know what to watch out for and I'll monitor how I'm feeling more closely."

"I think we all will," Albus chuckled wryly nodding his head in the direction of the two that had just walked out.

Minerva untangled her hand from the blankets and brought Albus' hand down to rest on her belly, craving the warmth and security of his touch. Seeing her eyes were closing, Albus pressed his lips to the top of her head. "Sleep now, Tabby, our kittens are safe."

**You guys didn't REALLY think I would let anything happen to the babies did you? Especially this early on… I do love seeing Minerva have to rely on those around her though, despite that stubborn Scottish streak of pride that I know all too well, myself.**

**Wonder what the student body will be saying. Will they have guessed? Will more vicious rumours arise with Dumbledore's hasty exit from the ministry to be by Minerva's side? Will their relationship ever be sanctioned or admitted?**

**PSSST! Guess what? I'll give you a little clue. Next chapter there is some BIG news Dumbledore brings back from the Wizengamot. And I'm afraid it's not good...**

**So tell me what you thought! Review!**


	7. Chapter 6: The Warmth of Family

**I know, I know, I should be strung up by my toes in the dungeons a la Filch, but if it's any consolation, I HAVE been writing! Simply not in order, and mostly during university lectures so that I have to type everything up. If someone could send me a Quick Quotes Quill I would be able to update much faster, but as it is I have to work my magic 'wandlessly'. **

**So without further ado, chapter 6! **

"Now you're sure you'll be alright?" Albus eyed Minerva warily as he set her down in bed after he'd insisted on carrying her from the hospital wing much to her chagrin.

"Fine, Albus. We'll be fine!" Minerva patted her belly before touching his face tenderly as she reassured him. "Now Albus, you HAVE to GO. It's been nearly an hour since you were called back!" she admonished lightly.

"Get some rest my dear," Albus kissed her forehead before standing once more. "I'll be back tonight, as soon as the meetings are over and we'll have dinner, just the two of us. Er, well four of us as it may be," he smiled down at the bulge at her middle. "I'll let Harry and Hermione in on my way out."

He left the bedroom reluctantly, and almost instantly Harry and Hermione came in. "How are you feeling, professor?"

Minerva smiled, albeit tiredly, "Much improved I believe, thank you. Now since you're here as my de-facto babysitters as it may be, you might as well call me Minerva when we're alone."

She turned back the covers, "Now Harry, if you would be so kind as to help me over to the chair by the fire it would be much appreciated."

"Oh but Pro-Minerva," Hermione bit her lip nervously, "Professor Dumbledore said you were to stay in bed and rest."

"Professor Dumbledore, or Albus as I'm sure he would prefer you to call him, says a great many things to which I pay no mind. It's one of the benefits, if not prerequisites of being a fiancée I believe."

At the pair's blank looks, Minerva had to laugh. "We've been engaged for 45 years. He proposed after we'd defeated Grindenwald while I was still working as an Auror."

"YOU were an auror, professor?" Harry burst out incredulously.

Minerva arched an eyebrow. "Minerva, Harry…And yes I was, one of the youngest ever I believe. Not to mention the first female witch to hold the position."

Hermione's response however, was more along the lines of, "45 years?!"

Minerva laughed again, this time pulling a delicate silver necklace chain from beneath her robes, revealing strung on it a two carat emerald, flanked by glittering diamonds along either side of the slim band.

She slipped it onto her ring finger, pulling it off again quickly so that Harry and Hermione could see the elegantly scrolled 'eternitas' before it faded from her skin with the absence of the ring.

"That is SO romantic," Hermione gushed as Minerva snorted, seeing the wheels turning in Harry's head that very obviously revealed his thoughts to be "AND she has a tattoo?"

"The folly of youth," she replied, a wry wistful smile crossing her face. "I believe you both are very well acquainted with it."

Harry held out his arm for the older witch to take as she rose, ever graceful, from the bed. Leaning heavily on Harry's arm despite herself, Minerva allowed herself to be helped over to the lesser squashy armchair by the fire in the sitting room, although saying 'less' wasn't really saying much knowing Albus' preferences in chairs.

Minerva sat for a moment, frustrated at how tired she still felt even after several hours in bed. "Hermione, dear, would you be so kind as to fetch the pile of essays on my writing desk in the study?" she gestured towards another adjoining room.

"Shouldn't you try and rest?" Hermione asked hopefully, despite know what Minerva's response would be. "Your health…"

"My MENTAL health will be endangered if I'm forced to spend one more moment 'resting' or in bed. This is my compromise."

Hermione sighed and headed, defeated, towards the other room as she went to get the papers.

"Can I get you anything professor?" Harry enquired as he set an equally squashy footstool down at her feet.

"I hate to ask, Harry, really, but I'd love a cup of tea. Poppy, Madam Pomfrey, has insisted I try and use less magic outside of the classroom…some nonsense about preserving my strength."

"Course, professor."

Harry returned a few minutes later with a heavily laden tea-tray. "I know, I know it's a bit overkill," he explained in response to Minerva's amused expression as she peered up at him over her glasses. "I just asked for a cup of tea and some biscuits for someone who wasn't feeling well and they gave me all this!" He gestured to the double tiered silver platter once he'd set it down.

Along with a large pot of tea, covered in an extraordinarily lumpy tea cozy, part of Dobby's legacy no doubt, there were heaped on each tier a stunning variety of biscuits and crackers as well as delicate sponges and scones heaped high with fruit jellies and clotted cream.

Minerva just smiled and shook her head slightly as she examined the overflowing contents of the tray before selecting a biscuit from the second tier. "Ah, ginger newts," she exclaimed happily, "my favourite. And please you two, help yourselves; even eating for two I'd never be able to put away all this."

The ginger in the biscuit seemed to calm her tummy, and she went back to marking the third years transfiguration essays. Harry and Hermione sprawled out on the rug in front of the fire with their schoolbooks and started on their potions essays, which were to be 5 rolls of parchment in length detailing the effects cross-cutting had on wolfsbane and how the result differed if the stalks were cute lengthwise.

After an hour or so, Harry removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes tiredly. "I'm glad Snape is back and everything now that I know the story behind what he did, but this is a bit ridiculous. D'you suppose he's making up for the time he was gone?"

Hermione, who had already managed to fill three rolls in comparison to Harry's one and a half, smiled sympathetically but held a finger to her lips, motioning for silence and nodding her head in the direction of their professor, who'd dozed off in the middle of marking essays.

Rising carefully from the mountain of books she'd buried herself in, Hermione gently slipped the essay from the sleeping woman's hand while Harry gently removed her glasses and folded them, putting them back in their case on the side table.

"She looks so fragile like this, Harry," Hermione whispered, choking up slightly and then coughing as if annoyed at her own emotions.

"I wish there was something more we could do for her," Harry agreed, pausing a moment in thought before disappearing back into the bedroom and returning after a moment with a woolly tartan afghan he had seen folded on the foot of the bed earlier.

He laid it over her gently as Hermione cautiously transfigured the armchair to stretch slowly without waking the woman in the chair, and lengthening and reclining the seat until it more resembled a chaise so that her professor was lying down.

Hermione looked rather pleased with herself as she put her wand down and surveyed her handiwork once she'd finished. "There!" she exclaimed happily, "Hopefully that's a little better. At least her feet are up now."

The way their professor had fallen asleep, they could just see the gentle slope of her belly underneath the afghan. The pair watched her for a moment more, deep in thought.

"I don't know what I'd do if something happened to her," Hermione admitted tearfully.

"I lost my parents, Hermione. I lost my parents, and I lost Sirius and Remus," he stared blankly into the fire, his gaze so bleak and haunted that it gave Hermione chills to meet his eyes. "If, if I lose her too…" he nodded his head in the direction of the exhausted witch; "Other than the Weaselys I've never known what it was like to have a mum or dad. But if I knew what it was to have a mum, if I had to choose or name someone it would be her."

Hermione nodded sadly, the words Harry spoke so genuinely resonated in her soul as well. "Ever, ever since I had to erase my parent's memories, and even before that God forgive me…I used to pretend she was my mum. It's stupid really, I know. But it's true…And I know that I'm of age now, but no one our age lives alone yet Harry, and I can't help myself thinking that it's not fair." Hermione's voice broke at the end of her impassioned, whispered speech as she sat, looking into the flames, her knees hugged to her chest.

Harry nodded and they both turned to look at the sleeping woman who had been as much of a mother to them as any biological connection could do. They fell silent once more, arms wrapped around each other in a simple display of friendship.

Minerva had woken a moment after Harry had spread the blankets over her shoulders. Now, as she felt their gazes upon her despite her closed eyes, she tried in vain to hold back the sob that had gathered in the back of her throat – causing her whole head to ache until she couldn't stand it any longer and she opened her eyes, not caring in the slightest as one tear, then another rolled down her cheek.

She bid them closer and they kneeled on either side of the armchair, their faces guilty and their eyes darting away in embarrassment.

In an act so far removed from her usual brisk demeanour as was possible, she placed a gentle hand at the back of Hermione's head, bringing it forward to kiss her forehead as the girl bowed her head in shame, before doing the same with Harry.

"You were always my cubs, you know," she admitted wryly as both students, old and experienced as they were, flung themselves into her arms and she held them tightly to her, her own composure slipping until tears dampened the bushy hair of Hermione.

After a long moment, they sat back, each furiously dashing a hand across their eyes to try and hide their tears. Minerva felt her heart swell as big as her belly as she looked at the two young people in front of her, so experienced and worn from war and trial, but so young, so so young.

"D'you mean that, professor?" Harry asked nervously, his brave façade slipping endearingly Minerva thought to herself as Lily Potter's expressive, earnest blue eyes stared up at her.

"I do, Harry. I know I'm known as somewhat of a cold, severe figure. But, like you, it's only time and pain of life that's built the wall no one can seem to see past." She smiled, thoughtful for a moment.

"That's why Albus is so good for me…It broke my heart to leave you that night, Harry, with the Dursleys. Truly I sat on that wall all night until they found you the next morning. I couldn't bear to leave you, it was onl because I wanted you safe that I did leave. Having the most talked about magical child of the world in the possession and care of the greatest witch of the century would have brought more attention to you than would have been safe."

"And every single time, a professor in the staff lounge mentioned you, Hermione. I couldn't have been prouder as though you were my own daughter. I'm ashamed to admit that at times I took as much pride and pleasure in you as real parents would."

"You're going to be an amazing mum, professor," Harry said honestly.

Hermione nodded, looking up once again almost shyly. "You've already proven that."

**Ooh fluff, how I love fluff. I did try to keep it canon though. Let me know how I did/am doing so far into this story. I have about 20000 words written, just not in the right order... **

**But REVIEW! And hopefully inspiration for the next chapter will come to me. **

**P.S. Fun fact, I went to the Harry Potter theme park in Orlando two years ago (I admit to you dear readers, I actually cried while I was there...) and I've only just now used the first piece of Hogwarts stationary from the kit I brought there to send a Hogwarts acceptance letter to my sister while she's at camp in Northern Ontario :) Pretty proud of myself, I wrote in green ink (calligraphy obviously) as per the books/movies and sealed it with red wax and an 'H' stamp. **

**Anyway, where was I? Damn Nargles been at my brain again. Ah yes, REVIEW!**


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